Betty Buckley takes on Dolly in a match made in heaven
Although indelibly associated with San Francisco’s own recently departed Carol Channing, who originated it, the title role of the indomitable matchmaker in the musical “Hello, Dolly!” has attracted a who’s who of big-name talent.
In the original Broadway production from 1964 to 1970 alone, Channing was followed by Ginger Rogers, Martha Raye, Betty Grable, Pearl Bailey, Phyllis Diller and Ethel Merman. Other productions starred Mary Martin, Betty White, Tovah Feldshuh, Bette Midler and Bernadette Peters, to say nothing of the movie with Barbra Streisand.
Now esteemed actress and singer Betty Buckley adds her name to that list, starring in the national tour of the Tony Award-winning 2017 Broadway revival that opened this week at the SHN Golden Gate Theatre.
Known to many for her role as the stepmom on TV’s “Eight Is Enough,” Buckley is a Broadway veteran who won a 1983 Tony as Grizabella in the original Broadway production of “Cats.” Making her Broadway debut as Martha Jefferson in 1969’s “1776,” she went on to notable turns in Broadway’s “Pippin,” “The Mystery of Edwin Drood,” “Carrie,” “Sunset Boulevard” and “The Triumph of Love.” Just in the last couple of years she’s been seen on screen in M. Night Shyamalan’s movie “Split” and TV’s “Supergirl” and “Preacher.” She’s also put out almost 20 CDs, most recently “Hope” on Palmetto Records last year.
Buckley was approached to do the “Hello, Dolly!” tour while she was filming “Preacher” in New Orleans last year.
“I was in shock, because I never had the show on my radar,” she says. “It’s not something I ever thought I would do or wanted to do. But how could I say no? It’s a huge honor to be taking this glorious piece of artistic accomplishment in the musical theater on the road across America in a time period where people really need to feel this kind of fun and humor and joy.”
Although she’d seen “Hello, Dolly!” Broadway icon Betty Buckley calls playing the title role in “Hello, Dolly!” one of the most physically demanding jobs she has undertaken.
in her teens, Buckley says it never really resonated with her until she saw the 2017 revival with Bette Midler, the same production she’s now taking on tour.
“I was just standing and weeping at the end,” she says. “And I turned to my brother who was with me and said, ‘This may be the greatest piece of musical theater I’ve ever seen.’”
So what is it about the character of Dolly Gallagher Levi that keeps everyone coming back for more after all these years?
“I think of her as a kind of highly intuitive, gifted, funny little sage who just knows some stuff and uses her femininity in that time period, in the 1890s, when feminism was just starting to be something people thought about,” Buckley says.
“You know, it’s a tough job assignment to play a wonderful being,” she adds. “In ‘Preacher’ I played this evil
Cajun sorceress who consumed people’s souls when they didn’t pay their debt. It’s kind of an actress’ dream come true to play these two characters in the same year that are at opposite ends of the spectrum.”
Even as a seasoned stage veteran, somehow this is Buckley’s first time in a full touring production.
“I thought Norma Desmond was the hardest part I’d ever play in terms of just physical stamina and emotional, psychological stamina,” she says. “And that was a piece of cake compared to this. Which also probably has something to do with the fact that I was in my 40s then and I’m 71 now.”
Not that she needs any help in getting up for each performance.
“When the show starts I feel like I’m being shot out of a cannon,” she says. “That’s the level of adrenaline. Or it feels like one of those girls that ride those horses in Atlantic City that jump off the high, high, high board into a pool below. After the curtain comes down in every show, my leading man Lewis Stadlen and I just look at each other and sigh a long sigh.”